Page 125 of Harbinger

I hold the book out toward him.

But he doesn’t take it.

“Keep it,” he says. “You’ve earned the answers in there.”

Bishop turns toward the door, reaching to turn down the light.

“Wait.” The word slips out before I can stop it. “Leave the light on. I don’t want to be in the dark.”

He nods, not looking back at me. But his hand moves to grip the doorframe, knuckles whitening. He shifts, just enough that I think he’ll turn around. He doesn’t.

“Try to sleep,” he says instead. “Your wounds need time to heal.”

I stare at the closed door long after he leaves. Without him here, the room feels too empty and sleep too far away.

My gaze drops to the book resting against my thigh. I don’t know if I want the answers inside it, but I can’t keep running. From the truth. From myself.

From him.

But when I flip it open, I find the ink faded from time and dense notes occupying every margin. But that’s not the problem. I flip the page. Then another.

The whole thing is written in the ancient tongue.

Of course.

Those are the answers I earned.

Just like his trust.

He’s not going to give me either until I prove myself.

Even if I already hold his biggest secret in my hands.

The burden snaps the last fragile thread holding me together. Tears come hard. Fast. They rip out of me as though my grief is overdue and they’re here to collect that pittance of me that remains. I curl in on myself, letting the book fall to the floor. I can’t bring myself to pick it up. To face the truth that even it seems determined to show me.

I let it happen.

Not just tonight.

In Wintour. At the palace. During every moment when someone else stepped in front of me because I couldn’t stand my ground.

Kieren paid the price.

So did Bishop.

I won’t let it happen again.

No one else bleeds for me.

The tears don’t stop. Maybe I don’t want them to. Maybe they’re the key to my own resurrection. So, I give in to them until exhaustion creeps in and dulls the night into softer focus, dragging me toward the place between here and dreams. I let it take me. But the question I should have asked Bishop follows me there.

Why did he find that note in my bedroom after midnight?

TWENTY-THREE

Ionly leave my room to bury Kieren’s body and begin Interstice, the traditional period before his soul finally rests.

But even the funeral isn’t really leaving. I might as well be moving through fog. Hands on my arms to steady me. Lenora murmuring instructions. The hollow thud of a coffin hitting packed dirt. The wrongness of newly disturbed ground that’s been forced to make room for something that doesn’t belong there. Someone who shouldn’t be there.